The electronics industry continues to rely upon advances in semiconductor technology to realize higher-function devices in more compact areas. For many applications realizing higher-functioning devices requires integrating a large number of electronic devices into a single silicon wafer. As the number of electronic devices per given area of the silicon wafer increases, the manufacturing process becomes more difficult.
Ever decreasing size of electronic systems demands smaller and thinner electronic components. An electronic component such as an integrated circuit typically uses a small piece of silicon wafer. However, its final size becomes much bigger after packaging and adding contact pins. Solder balls or pads are increasingly being used on the bottom of integrated circuits or even discrete components to replace conventional metal pins and wire bonds. However, to improve system reliability, a semiconductor component mostly needs to be packaged to provide sidewall protection and preventing cracks.
The packaging of an IC device is increasingly playing a role in its ultimate performance. For example, in mobile devices (i.e., mobile phones, tablet computers, laptop computers, remote controls, etc), Wafer Level Chip Scale Packaging (WLCSP) components are used in their assembly. WLCSP components save valuable space in the mobile device. After assembly, in some example processes, customers encapsulate these WLCSP devices by injection molding or casing. This manual post-processing of the bare WLCSP may result in device damage; therefore, generally, handling of the WLCSP devices should be minimized.
When device size is small, for example in millimeters or less, unprotected sidewalls may touch solder material and the device may malfunction. FIG. 1 shows a section of a system 100 in which a device 102 is shown as being soldered to solder pads on a printed circuit board (PCB). As depicted, due to a small size, there is a likelihood that solder material 104 may touch sidewalls of the device 102.